In Flagrante Delicto
by Miranda Crystal-Bearer
Summary: What if Niko was not a saint, but a sinner? Cal's an abomination...but Niko's a monster. DARK AU of Madhouse, trigger warnings inside. Part of the Malum in Se universe.
1. Chapter One: Old and New

**A/N:** I do not own Madhouse, Caliban Leandros, Niko Leandros, or any of the characters so contained in the works of the Cal Leandros series. These characters are owned by Rob Thurman. I do not own the song used to start the chapter!

I'm just borrowing the ideas for my own twisted games.

_What would happen if Niko was not a saint, but a sinner? What if Cal was an abomination...but Niko was a monster_? How would their lives be changed? It's a dark descent into the depths of depravity, dependence, hate, and abuse. Strap yourselves in tightly. It's going to be a violent ride.

**TRIGGER WARNINGS:** Physical and emotional abuse, self-injury, alcohol abuse, victim complex, murder, torture, overall misuse of Cal and total destruction of Niko's character.

Welcome to round three! Let's get this party started.

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**Madhouse** AU -_ In Flagrante Delicto  
_Part of the _Malum in Se_ universe

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_In flagrante delicto:_ From the Latin; in flaming wrong  
_Malum in se:_ From the Latin; evil in and of itself, an act that is considered wrong to commit.

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_**Chapter One:** Old and New_

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_I know there's pain...  
__Why do you lock yourself up in these chains?  
__No-one can change your life except for you  
__Don't ever let anyone step all over you  
__Just open your heart and your mind  
__Mmm, is it really fair to feel this way inside?  
_-"Hold On," Wilson Philips

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I was sweeping the giant garage when I heard the knock on the door.

As I went to answer the door, I heard Niko, up in the apartment, crank up the radio really, really loud. I recognized the song, and grinned as I opened the door.

It was Robin, standing there outside the old fire station that was mine and Niko's new home. After a little negotiation with the Italian Mob, we were the proud owners of a heap of junk that needed a lot of serious cleaning and re-furnishing before it was really livable. But it was_ ours_ and hell, we could clean. We'd stayed in worse places, and this time, nobody was going to evict us unexpectedly. This place was ours.

I grinned at Robin, and didn't ask how he'd known where to find us. This was Robin we were talking about, after all.

He started to say something. I silently held a finger to my lips, then beckoned to him, still grinning. He frowned, puzzled, but obeyed, following me in. The shutting door was hidden by the song on the radio, the female voices crooning sweet and gentle. It wasn't until we'd crossed the two-firetruck garage space and started up the stairs to the firemen's apartments that the drums and guitar kicked in_ loud_. Niko had it cranked almost all the way up, and I knew exactly why. I shushed Robin again - unnecessary, really, he was creeping along silently in good humor, though wincing at the loud music.

I stepped through the door, and stood grinning as I watched. Robin stepped in beside me, and stopped, blinking.

With his back to us, Niko was dancing barefoot to the music with his broom. I knew he was also lip-syncing to the lyrics, and his braid swayed as he tossed his head, the end snapping like a whip-crack. He was really into it. He loved this song. I leaned on the doorframe and watched the show, because really? This was hilarious. Blackmail gold.

_'You could sustain...mmmm, or are you comfortable with the pain?'_ I nodded my head to the song, and yeah I was going deaf pretty much, but I wasn't interrupting Niko's impromptu dance with his beloved broom there. Nah, definitely not. I glanced at Robin. His expression had gone from shocked to deeply, deeply amused, especially as Niko snatched the broom and held it like a microphone, all dramatic and shit. It was hilarious.

It was even better when he spun around, and saw us watching.

He immediately jerked to a halt, whipped the broom behind him, and blushed a brilliant, flaming scarlet.

Mark that down on the books - Niko_ never_ blushed.

I laughed as I walked over and turned the radio way down, until the next song coming on was only a low thrum. "Damn, Nik, you were putting some sexy moves on that broom. True love, eh?"

"Oh, fuck you with a spork." He was still bright red - hah, even his_ ears_ were flushed!

Robin wore the expression of a man trying desperately not to laugh lest he end up violently murdered via broom. Me, I didn't care if Niko tried it, mostly because I knew he probably wasn't going to kill me. He'd spent the last twenty years keeping me alive; why waste all that time to kill me now? Yeah, who was I kidding, Niko was probably plotting exactly how to dispose of the remains even now. I grinned cheerfully at him. He flipped me off.

"The things you can do with your hips are truly divine," Robin said at last, laughter barely constrained.

I watched the ensuing explosion with great interest. I'd never really seen Niko spar against someone he didn't actually have to hold back on. With Robin, if Niko didn't push, he was halfway to ending up trounced already. Robin was a damn good fighter, despite his self-proclaimed cowardice. He snatched up the broom I'd left in the corner, and blocked Niko's overhead swing. Grateful Niko wasn't wearing his weighted gloves, I took a seat on the floor and watched the entertainment.

Niko wasn't actually angry, just embarrassed and looking for an excuse to change the subject. I crossed my legs, propped my elbows on my knees and my chin in my hands, and watched them go. Wood clattered on wood as they duked it out. Niko, liking the heft, wielded his broom with the straw on the far end, like an axe. Robin, on the other hand, kept the straw end behind his hands like a hilt. Niko was snake-quick and favored powerful blows; Robin was agile and made quick darting strokes. The footwork was impeccable and impressive. It was like dancing, almost, because no-one was mad or even trying for killing blows. I could tell, against Robin, that Niko's style of fighting was patchwork from over a hundred different styles. He blended them almost seamlessly, but Robin fought with a pure, simple style I was willing to bet they'd used in the gladiator's arena. Ancient as fuck, but no less deadly, and I watched as he ducked his curly head under one of Niko's strikes and very neatly poked my older brother in the solar plexus. Niko doubled over wheezing. Chuckling, Robin stood back and lowered his broom. "Truce?"

"Only if you stop ogling my ass," Niko retorted, straightening.

"Well, that means I've got time to go make popcorn," I chimed in, brightly. They both looked at me, and I realized the mistake I'd made. "Oh _fuckit_!" I scrambled and they lunged. I was laughing, though, and Robin's forest green eyes were bright, and Niko was smiling.

With _both_ of them out to whoop my ass, I didn't last all that long. Hell no. I was a good fighter, but they were both better.

I lay sprawled on the floor ten minutes later and pushed at Niko's leg over my chest. Robin was sitting on my shins. "Fuck, you guys don't fight fair," I whined, mostly just to whine because hell, I already knew Niko didn't fight fair. I'd been a little surprised by how Robin had followed his lead, but maybe I shouldn't have been.

"All's fair in love and war, little brother," Niko told me, affectionately. I flipped him off and he chuckled. This had to be war, then, 'cause love sure as fuck didn't mean you ganged up on your baby brother with a thousands-of-years-old immortal.

My cell phone started ringing. It was on the kitchen counter. I shoved at Niko's leg again. "Lemme up, bastard!"

"Fine, fine." Niko moved his leg and Robin climbed to his feet.

I scrambled off into the kitchen. There were only three people who called these days, and Niko and Robin were two of them. That left Promise, and it wasn't right to keep a lady waiting. Promise was a lady, and Niko had taught me to have good monster manners. So I hurried and grabbed the phone. I'd mentioned to Promise, a few months ago, that I was job-hunting. She apparently had decided that meant she should find me odd jobs to do with her...friends or less-than-friends. Not that I was complaining, fuck no, but it was confusing.

Robin had actually gotten me a real job last month, with a not-exactly-friend of his. So now I was a bartender in a bar for paien. The first week we'd had a barfight every night, two murders, and not a policeman in sight. Definitely my kind of place. Unfortunately, every peri in there had taken a distinct dislike to Niko from the moment he'd shown up. Since myth said they were supposed to be related to angels, or were angels, and Niko wasn't exactly a shining example of virtue... Yeah. He didn't come in much. It really irked him too; he was used to coming in to whatever shitty bar I was currently working at and lurking for at least part of the evening. He could get away with that, because nobody in a bar cared what you did as long as you at least bought a beer. And everyone wanted to talk to the bartender anyway. Bartenders were apparently the cheapest form of therapy most people could afford. I don't give good relationship advice, though. "Grow a pair and talk to her," seemed pretty damn straightforward to me, but apparently it's not all that simple.

What the hell would I know, anyway? I've never had a girlfriend, and the only consistent relationship I've managed over my life is the one with my abusive brother. And that's only last 'cause he won't let me rot in a corner like my monster half deserves.

Family. There's no living with them, no living without them. I would know.

So Niko would come check up on me and make sure his little monster brother was minding his monster manners. I did return the favor, but the places Niko picked up work didn't look too kindly on loiterers. Niko chilling in a bar is one thing. Me chilling in the waiting lobby of the mechanic shop is another, and with the look I sport I'm bad for business. I look like trouble. Niko does too, but he's more charming than I am anyway and can get away with it.

I wondered what kind of job Promise had this time as I answered my phone. "Hello?"

"Caliban. I hope this afternoon finds you well?"

"Uh, yeah, I'm good. What's up?"

Promise began to detail the job. I got a notepad and took notes. Hey, I've got a good memory, but I wanted to give all the details to Nik. He was the one who handled that shit, really. I was pretty sure Promise knew that Niko and I were both going on these jobs she kept finding me, but she never talked to Niko. After she'd figured out he was the one bruising me up seven ways 'till Sunday, she'd stopped liking his ass and hadn't said a word to him since. Me, though, she kept talking to. I think she was under some delusion that she'd be able to rescue me or some shit. Make me see the goddamn light and get away from Niko.

Fat chance of that. I knew exactly what I was doing. I knew that it wasn't right or normal for people to abuse other people. But the thing was, I wasn't people. I was a monster. Half Auphe, half human, and all Aupheling. I didn't deserve the happy normal lives other people got, because I sure as hell wasn't normal. But Niko didn't hurt me because he hated me. He kept me in line, made me think, reminded me to keep myself in check. He loved me and he was the only one in the world who'd stayed by me despite everything. He'd protected me and kept me safe and he loved me.

Monsters don't deserve love, either.

I didn't deserve Niko, but he didn't give a damn. He'd stay with me anyway.

Promise had the wrong idea. She thought Niko was keeping me. Hello no. I could leave any damn time I wanted to. Niko'd made that clear. If I got done with his shit (and he freely admitted he had a hell of a lot of shit to deal with) then I could go. Get up and leave and he wouldn't stop me, if that was what I wanted.

But I didn't want to. Not only was there the question of who else in the world was going to trust somebody half-Auphe, or even give me the time of day, but there was the fact that Niko needed me. Niko needed me. He was a wreck, my brother, screwed in the head and half a drunk and with a temper like a rabid wolf...but he was my brother, who loved me and needed me to remind him that life wasn't always shit. Sometimes, it was okay. I could make him laugh and that was good in my book.

We hadn't had a lot of friends in our lives. But hearing Niko and Robin talking in the background, I thought that might be changing. Good. Niko needed a friend who was not me and my bundle of emotional issues. Hell, I was half of Niko's own triggers to melt-downs and blow-ups of the psychological kind. Yeah, outside influence. Robin was good. Annoying as hell, but he was optimistic, smooth, and had a sense of mischief that Niko particularly enjoyed. Trouble was all good fun.

I thanked Promise for the call and the job, and hung up. I wandered back into what was going to be the living room. "Let's have a job full of trigger issues. It's a kidnapping and ransom! Pack the tranqs and get ready to fly over the cuckoo's nest."

Niko gave me a long measuring look, grey eyes speculative. "Well, I didn't hit you in the head. Robin, did you?"

"No." Robin was grinning, though. "Your method of coping with your mental trauma is certainly interesting. Immersion is not exactly the path I'd have chosen."

Immersion, sure. It was called getting the hell on with life. Niko had been kidnapped by Robin's crazy evil twin (here we go with the family again) and I'd pretty much flipped my shit so hard I'd come back out sane. Or something close enough to it. Then I and my monster half of the family had wrecked Hob, torn him to pretty little pieces, and I'd rescued Niko who'd been pretty much catatonic for three days after. Oh, and I'd rescued the little psychic girl who barely half a year earlier I'd tortured and almost killed - and three days after the rescue she'd told me she forgave me everything and didn't hate me.

Hell, and people_ wondered_ why I had issues.

"Hey, a paycheck is a paycheck. Besides, we survived, and it's been, what, six months? Niko's leading this gig anyway. Here." I tossed him the notepad. He caught it effortlessly and examined the information on it.

"Tonight. Such wonderful advance warning. This will curtail our cleaning spree." Niko sighed, his gaze fixed on the paper. I watched him reach up and absently scratch at the healing scar on his left temple. No more stitches or scabbing, but the wound that had once been a cracked skull via troll-caused-cave-in was healed up, mostly. It was still a livid red-purple of a new scar, but that would fade. The hilarious thing about it was the four-inch-long scar extended back into his hairline, and the hair around it was starting to turn silver and white. Niko, vain as anything, was utterly appalled. He liked his blonde hair, and greying prematurely, well.

I did not have blonde hair. My own hair was black as black, and my skin pale to Niko's olive tan. The only thing that really marked us as brothers was our eyes; we both had iron grey eyes. I sighed and sat on the floor - there was nowhere else to sit. Our new place had shit in the way of furniture. We were working on that.

"She invited me to lunch again," I reported to Niko. "Tomorrow. That awesome pizza place we went before."

"Mmm. Try not to eat all it of, this time. Bring me some leftovers." Niko tossed me a grin.

He'd be there, no mistake, but he wouldn't be eating with us. Niko and I didn't trust Promise one bit. She's as good as said she'd protect me from Niko if I ever left him (and that made it sound like some kind of bad teenage girlfriend-boyfriend drama) but Niko said he wouldn't put it past her to up and kidnap me for my own good. She gave to all kinds of charities and shit, and after some thinking I'd agreed with Niko. So I never met Promise entirely by myself. I wasn't sure if she knew that or not, but I knew it and that was good enough for me.

"Well, that leaves off tomorrow for me," Robin sighed. "I was wondering, Caliban, if I could treat you to lunch somewhere. I feel like I've been paying an inordinate amount of attention to Niko lately."

Damn straight he had. I'd been avoiding the hell out of Robin for months now.

Why?

Because somewhere during out kidnapping adventure, he'd found some of the bruises Niko had given me. Not the bad ones, just the speckling across the back of my neck where Niko always pinched me. Reminders, affection, reprimand...he pinched me to get my attention for whatever reason, on the back of my neck and along the backs of my arms, where it was tender and would sting and leave a dark bruise. I didn't care, but Robin had known somebody was pinching the hell out of me. And I think he knew it was Niko, and I think he knew it wasn't just pinching, but I didn't want to talk about. I'd told Niko I would, but I didn't want to.

It would change things. Robin would look at me like Promise did; with pity. I didn't need anyone's pity.I wasn't a victim. I was a monster. I was here with Niko by my own damn choice, and if I wanted to make bad life choices, who was going to stop me? My dead whore mother? My alcoholic brother? My monster half of the family? Yeah, right. If I was going to dive headlong down the road to destruction, they'd be running with me every step of the way.

A big part of it, though was that I _liked_ Robin. I did. I didn't want that to change. Half the time he acted like he'd forgotten I was a monster, and that was new and refreshing. Not just knew and didn't give a damn, like Niko, but forgot that was I an Aupheling. I halfway liked that and halfway thought it was damn stupid because it was like forgetting the snake in your pocket was a rattlesnake.

But yeah. I didn't want to talk about it.

Fortunately, I had a ready excuse today to even avoid answering Robin. "Oh shit, if we're going on a job tonight, I need more ammo! Nik!"

Niko stared at me, then hit himself in the head with the notepad in exasperation. "God, Cal, today she closes early! Why didn't you think about this an hour earlier? Fuck! Go get your shoes and wallet. Robin, help me get the car out of the garage." Niko shot to his feet in one lithe motion.

I scrambled up and pelted to my room. Well, okay, the one room that was currently habitable. Had I mentioned this place was a wreck? I grabbed sneakers for both of us, my wallet, one of my Glocks, my jacket, Niko's jacket, and trusted he had a short sword in the car he could use. I also snagged both phones off the kitchen counter as I went charging down the rickety metal stairs in bare feet. Robin was manning one giant sliding door, and Niko was easing our puke-green El Camino out onto the street, skimming it under the opening door with inches to spare. As I ran past Robin, I shouted a thanks his way. Niko did me one better, though. As I climbed in the passenger side and slammed the door behind me, Niko leaned out his open window and flicked something at Robin's curly head.

Robin ducked and flashed up an impossibly quick hand to catch the glittering missile. It was a key ring, with keys.

"Lock up," Niko called, cheerfully. "And keep them, they're yours!"

With that he gunned the motor and peeled out into the street, leaving Robin standing there in our driveway with a startled look on his handsome face.

"You gave him the keys to our house?" I asked, as I squirmed on the seat and shoved my feet into my battered black Keds. I set Niko's in the middle of the bench seat for him, along with his jacket. "It's our house." I used the pocket-holster already in my jean jacket's inner pocket to hide my Glock 30. I checked the other pockets for extra magazines. Check and check. Ready to roll. I shoved my cell-phone in my back pocket.

"He is now our backup plan. Since we are staying, we can't be lone wolves anymore. And I don't think he'll betray the trust. He's not very used to being trusted at all, and that we do is something very important to him." Niko shrugged a little. "Pass me the kodachi under your side of the seat."

I wasn't sure I agreed entirely, but I trusted Nik's judgement. The man should have been a psychology major instead of a History major. I bent over and fished blindly for the requested short sword. "Say that after I tell him you beat my ass."

"Cal." Nothing else but exasperation, disappointment, and annoyed expectations. Only Niko could deliver and entire rant in a single word, and that word being my name.

"Look, I just...Niko, I..." I sat up with the sword in hand and tried not to see how close niko cut it when he snapped between a taxi cab and a limo to get into the other lane. Niko drove like he owned the road, and right of way was a challenge to be taken by the bravest warrior who got there first. It wasn't road rage, it was simple disregard for any and all rules. Rules, he said, were for people who didn't know how to do it right. Funny how the cops never agreed.

"To be honest, Cal...I think he already knows." Niko changed lanes again, and leaned briefly on the horn before flipping someone the bird. "I think he just wants us to tell him ourselves. Some of the things he's said..." He trailed off, and shook his head. "Did I tell you last week I saw him at one of my cage matches?"

I blinked. Niko got his kicks and extra spending money in illegal cage matches. I say illegal, it was just...they weren't sanctioned, and most of the guys doing the betting were drug dealers. Niko had actually been in some on behalf of the Italian Mob, because we were both now apparently associates. Do a supernatural fetch job, get an in with the Mob. Go figure. And an old fire-house. But most of Niko's fights took place in down and dirty bars, warehouses, and back lots. Not the scene I would think Robin would frequent at all.

"No. Really?"

"Really. He was...with someone." Niko's delicacy covered a multitude of carnal sins, there. I was glad for the discretion. Robin was voracious in his sexual appetites, and I didn't want to know. "He looked just as surprised to see me as I was him. We didn't talk, though. No time."

No, not with the way Niko's fights went; too fast, too violent, and barely enough time between matches to spit the blood out. I used to go with him. I didn't anymore. It was just...too much, for both of us. Niko couldn't keep an eye on me in the crowds. I couldn't stand him fighting without being able to freely join in if he needed it. Not that he ever did; Niko only lost on points and technicalities, never in the actual fighting. But still. You watch your brother get pinned to the floor and take a few shots to the kidneys, and see how well _you_ stand it. I couldn't. I only went now on special occasions, and didn't follow along, because Niko went regularly. It was almost like he needed the fights, in a way; he loved the brutality, the fighting itself. The money was just a bonus. Niko worked two jobs already; he was a mechanic at an antique car shop days, and worked as a TA at the local college in the evenings. He'd always worked damn hard, long as I could remember; money was always a concern for us. We lived hand to mouth, most of the time. Lately, though, with three jobs, Niko's fighting, and monster-hunting on the side, (and not having to pay rent) we were edging into the territory where we didn't collect our pocket change just to make a grocery run for the week.

Niko had made sure I'd always gotten fed, though. Even when money was at its tightest, he'd never skimped on feeding me. I knew there'd been times he'd gone without, just to make sure I had enough...and not long ago in the past, either.

Niko was many, many things...but first and foremost, he was my brother.

"The only thing he asked, next day at lunch, was how often I went. I told him maybe every month or so." Which was a blatant lie. Niko went every two weeks, or less. Just enough time to let the bruises go green before he got more. There were some fighters who wouldn't fight him now, he said. I knew why; Niko didn't hold back and didn't give out mercy.

"Oh shit Nik truck!" I yelped.

"Fuckin'_ hell_!" Niko spat, and did some maneuvering that would have done a stunt driver in any _Fast and Furious_ movie proud. I held onto the door handle and didn't scream. Why anyone puts a delivery truck right in the middle of the lane, stopped, in afternoon school traffic is beyond me. I really didn't need any coffee now, though. Probably wouldn't for a whole damn week. Jesus _Christ._

"We almost _died_." I slumped in my seat.

"It'll take more than a traffic accident to kill us," Niko retorted, but his words were bitten sharp and I could smell the touch of fear and adrenaline.

Yeah. Right. Ultimate ignoble death, but I'd seen the results of traffic accidents at the speed Niko drove; hamburger meat pretty much described it. Even_ if_ you were wearing a seatbelt. I was. Niko did too. I rubbed at my face and wondered if praying would get us to Arkady's safe. Probably not. I wasn't completely convinced God even existed, let alone cared, but what the hell.

Arkady was Niko's preferred weapons-dealer. We had others, but Arkady has the best. I didn't know what she was, but she wasn't entirely human. She smelled...interesting. She was about four feet and some inches tall, with a bushy afro and huge dark sloe eyes. She was a mix of many races, weighed probably ninety pounds soaking wet, and took no bullshit from anyone. In fact, when she saw us walk in, five minutes from closing time, she sicced her stupid parrot on us. Blue and gold macaws can take your damn finger off if they like, and they've got wicked claws. Niko, the bastard, hip-checked me into tripping over a footstool (they were everywhere in the shop, I told you Arkady was _short_) and left me to my doom of parrot-bites and scratches.

"We need some forty-five hollowpoints and any forty-four magnums," Niko told her, towering over her only because there was a two-foot difference in their height. "Cal, if you can't keep yourself from being parrot bait..."

"Fuck you, I bet if I kill it she'll do something nasty to us!" I flailed my way up and dropped my jacket of the damn bird, pinning it to the floor. I was scratched and had feathers in my hair. The bird waddled out from under my jacket.

"Fuck you runnin'," it told me, saucily, and then flew up to perch on the top of a shelf.

"Spot on, child," Arkady told me, and bustled behind the counter. She was wearing jeans and a white tank today, with a plaid button-up thrown over it. "The usual, then. Niko, I have a brand new set of khukuri you will want to be looking at."

I went to the counter to pay up for my boxes of bullets, and Niko instantly went to investigate the sharp and shinies. Ammunition was expensive, but hell, there wasn't anywhere legal I could by this much in one go and not have people start marking me down as the next serial killer. Arkady probably thought we were serial killers anyway, what with Niko's obsession for anything with a bladed edge, but she didn't care because she was just that way.

Niko bought a khukuri and she gave us a discount. Hot damn.

We had a few hours left before we had to go meet with our kidnappers. Niko and I got takeout, because the kitchen in our place was still jacked up and had no stove. Niko had assured me that as soon as he got the place cleaned up a fraction more, there would be furniture and appliances, courtesy of our Mob friends. I wasn't so certain on that, but hell, if he said it I'd roll with it.

I got to drive while Niko at his nachos supreme. Burritos were easy to eat one handed while driving. While I ate and drove, Niko ate, outlined planning, and made contact with our customer via cell-phone. I just tried not to rear-end the moron in front of me as I drove home. I did notice, though, when Niko reached up and pressed two fingers right over the new scar on his temple.

"Hey, okay?" I asked, glancing his way.

"Yes. Headache. It'll pass." Niko offered a wan smile. Apparently a skull fracture left you prone to recurring headaches. Who knew. I was just glad it hadn't left him with recurring seizures. _Jesus_, once had been enough for me. More than enough. I had nightmares about it still. "So tell me what you remember about lamia, little brother."

Monster quiz review time. Yay.


	2. Chapter Two: Life and Death

**A/N:** I do not own anyone from the Cal Leandros series. I do not own the song lyrics used to start this piece!

Woot! A super special thanks to SensiblyTainted for the first review! Thanks also to halesgirl101, Kin-outcast101, Comuterale, and Parnassus for reviewing!

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_**Chapter Two:** Life and Death_

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_I don't find it funny right now  
__I want my mo-mo-mo-money right now  
__I'm on my way to the party right now_

_I can't wait for you to shut me up  
__To make me hip like bad-ass  
__I can't wait for you to shut me up  
__Shut it up!  
_-"Shut Me Up," Mindless Self-Indulgence

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Lamiae (correct Greek plural, thank you Niko, lamias is easier), in case you were wondering, are a kind of oversized humanoid leech. Lamia was this Greek queen who became a child-eating demon, says myth. Well, myth gets it wrong more than half the time. So, lamias. Human-sized, woman-shaped, with long black curtains of hair that shroud most of their bodies, round owl-golden unblinking eyes, and little round leech-mouths with tiny transparent teeth. They have a poison in their bite that paralyzes you while they suck your blood out, which can take days. They're not fast feeders. Slow agonizing death...sure, that's my dream girl. Bring her on.

Apparently, the friend of Promise's was another vampire, and the lamia in question was his mistress. Lover. Girlfriend. Drinking buddy. What the hell ever they called it these days.

Apparently vampires had worked it out that they didn't actually need to go around slaughtering humans; a hefty dose of iron and some other supplements, along with a little food, and they were good to go. Promise had told me that. Lamias weren't looking to change. It made me feel slightly less inclined for sympathy. I didn't like things that might eat me.

I followed Niko down the trail and into the depths of Central Park. Monsters liked Central Park. It was big, it was the closest thing to untamed in the middle of the city, and it was old. The park had been here nearly as long as the city itself, and most of it had never been built on. It was old land, wild land, and in the depths of the woods and the ponds, old and wild things lived. The occasional mugger, rapist, or murderer that vanished into the shadows here went unmissed as they sought to hide and got eaten instead. Niko and I knew a lot of the creatures that lived here, actually. We did a lot of running and sparring in the hidden places, and we had an informant here. Boggle lived in a mudhole only a little north of our destination tonight.

Too bad we weren't visiting him. I liked Boggle, what for all he was lazy, ate humans, and would have eaten me and Niko if he'd thought he could get away with it. He never would, because Niko and I were too good at fighting, but I knew how he felt about it.

We arrived at the appointed place early, thanks to Niko's need for promptness, and while Niko leaned on a tree I sat down on the ground to wait. The air was cool and crisp, fall flirting with winter, but the earth was still warm from the day's sunshine. I got comfy and fingered the hilt of the knife at my belt.

"So, why would anyone want a lamia back?" I asked Niko, idly. "They're not great talkers."

"I'm not sure, but it's neither here nor there. The important thing is getting paid," Niko returned, with cool and undeniable logic.

He had me there. "Yeah, so...while we're on the topic, how'd your breakup go?"

Niko's latest bobblehead girlfriend was now an ex-girlfriend. Cindy had been nice enough, but Niko never kept his girls for long. Niko rolled his eyes at my change of subject, but answered. "She threw her shoe at my head and left me with the bill. She also threatened to key up my car."

"Ah, so you pissed her off." I snorted, because Niko never let them cry if he could help it.

"Best way to do it. Then instead of moping they burn you in effigy and feel justified." Niko looked amused by the prospect. He would.

I caught a whiff of something and got to my feet again. "Ugh." It reeked; dank and stagnant water with the ripe and rancid taint of day-old dead fish beneath it. "They're coming, and they reek like you wouldn't believe. Something from the water." I put a hand over my nose. Yuck!

"Something from the water. That only narrows it down to several hundred among the paien. Thank you," Niko muttered, pushing away from his tree.

"Hey, I tried." I was also trying not to gag. Ugh. I hoped I'd get used to it in a minute. I drew one of my gns as the figure appeared from among the trees. Pale and humanoid, check. Alarming? Well, not really...

"Bishop-fish," Niko sighed. "Nothing extraordinary, easy to kill." He sounded disappointed. I was too. We could both eat fish-boy here for lunch and no trouble.

Dappled here and there with the ghost of scales over nearly transparent pale skin, the bishop fish had the shape of a human. Sort of. The shape of his head was a little off. Hairless and lightly scaled, it was oddly flattened and the mouth had tiny triangular teeth behind thick rubbery lips. No kelp eater, this one. He wasn't wearing a stitch - not a damn thing, which told me he didn't rub shoulders with the local New Yorkers much. I glanced down. Even they would give that a glance. Yeah, _that._

Now I knew where fish sticks came from. And I was never eating another one as long as I lived.

I decided keeping my gaze on his round unblinking eyes was the lesser of two evils. Guess you can't blink without eyelids. Round pupils took us in and the mouth opened to gurgle, "These are the demands. First-"

That was when I shot him.

I didn't have any patience to listen to that drowned-man's voice, and I was tired of smelling him. So I put a bullet right through his chest, which exploded like an overripe tomato and spattered fluid in a wide arc. With his impossibly wide mouth gaping, he teetered and began to fall. I reached out and swiped the paper from his fleshy hand as he crumpled to the ground with a disturbingly wet slapping sound.

Niko peered over my shoulder. "The usual?"

"The usual."

People. Nice, plump juicy people...and kids. Why was it always the kids? Most monsters didn't care about money; no, most of the nonhuman world cared about eating, and why work for your meals when you can have them delivered? One lamia for a truckload of people. Sure. Damn fine deal. Except we were here to put a serious wrench in the works. I didn't like things that ate humans; mostly on account of Niko being human and the fact that I was half, and therefore looked it on the outside. Have I mentioned I _really_ don't like things that might eat me? Yeah, no. Besides, people were people and deserved living. Most of them. Some were worse monsters than the things that ever went bump in the night, yours truly included.

Niko tipped his head. I smelled it, Niko heard it: the bishop-fish wasn't alone. "Well, let's hope we find this one less annoying to negotiate with."

I doubted it. The smell I was getting was of old things, attic must and hundreds of abandoned spiderwebs. In general, the older it smelled, the trickier it was going to be; nonhumans lived for years longer than humans, mostly, if they weren't outright immortal. I was pretty sure Robin was one of those 'outright immortal' ones. And he was tricky as all fuck.

This one was tricky and also very crazy. You could all but see it, shimmering off her in waves like heat off a summer road. Fuck my luck.

"Black Annis." Niko sounded pleased. "So much for that myth."

She scuttled with the back-and-forth motion of a poisonous centipede. Part of the time she was on two feet, the rest of the time on all fours. She looked like an old woman, but not a sad wraith in a nursing home or a cheerful crocheting grandma - unless it was one who'd have no problem picking her teeth with Hansel's gnawed shinbone. Now this was a little more disturbing than the fish. And it became more disturbing when six more of her appeared to race across the grass.

"Black Annis. Singular, plural?" I tossed at Nik, drawing my other gun and taking aim with both.

"Singular in traditional legend," Niko returned, airily, as he drew his katana. "Plural for our fun. A few old women shouldn't be trouble."

Old women, my ass. The seven of them were covering the ground with freakish speed. Long thick fingernails scored the ground, sending dirt flying, and their teeth...let's just say they weren't the kind that got put in a glass on the bedside table, unless she was a diehard Twisted Sister fan. The Annises, Anni, Black Annies...whatever - they weren't identical, but they were so similar they might as well have been. They all wore the same ragged black shifts; torn to streamers in places, the flesh beneath was grey under the moonlight but I suspected it was a dark cyanotic blue.

"Alright, you play shuffleboard with the grannies and I'll cheer you on from the sidelines," I retorted, but we both knew it was a lie. I wasn't going to let Niko have all the fun. No way in hell. And as one leaped for me, I took aim and shot her through the throat. I was expecting the fleshy explosion - I wasn't expecting the ricochet. "The fuck?"

Niko had ducked at the warning sound. I was startled long enough that a second hag got the jump on me; from nearly thirty feet away she launched herself off the ground and propelled herself into my chest with a force I hadn't suspected from her spidery frame. I hit the ground hard and with sharp pointed teeth snapping in my face. Really not my favorite landing.

I didn't lose my guns. I probably wouldn't have lost them even if I'd been dead. I jammed the muzzle of one right up in those pointy teeth and pulled the trigger. I didn't get the explosion of blood and brain matter I expected; I got the peculiar sound of a bullet pinging off an impervious spine and shooting out at an angle. Damn! I got a mouthful of blood as the exiting bullet took out half her throat. I kicked off the wriggling corpse and shot to my feet, gagging. That was vile.

And then I smelled it. "Oh hell, Nik, we are so not getting paid." I scrambled to my feet, and spat. "They ate her." I could smell it in the one I'd just killed. In her blood, in her breath, hell, leaking out her damn pores. I had one left; Niko, who'd moved some distance away to get elbow room, had four of them, two already bleeding black blood.

I could just see, in the dim moonlight, the paler slash of his death's-head-grin against his darker skin. His voice had the burr of laughter in it when he answered back, "Well, then, no need to hold back." Oh, he was having fun.

He lunged with deceptive speed; Niko was fast as lightning when he wanted to be. He blurred under the moonlight, a fatal shadow, and his katana glittered as he drove about nine inches of it into the Annis's single eye. He turned to present his side to her and lashed out with a foot to propel her off the blade and into another Annis.

No need to worry about him. Time to worry about that last one, the one that feinted once, twice, then plunged in from the side. Shit shit shit. I got an arm up, rammed an elbow in her throat, shot her twice in the gut, and got knocked down. Sharp teeth latched into my forearm and I shot her again on reflex. Hey, it's a good reflex to have. And then I was down on the ground, there was something with sharp teeth biting me, and guts...slithering...down my legs okay _what the fuck?!_

I went from pissed to panicked in one jolt, and promptly gated.

See, my monster family has this little trick called gating. Tearing a hole in reality to move. I can do it. And I did it; wrapped the energy around me in one instinctive flash and ended up on my knees right behind Niko. He nearly kicked me in the head; again, those good reflexes. We both had them. Last second he realized it was _me_ and his foot snapped past so close it ruffled my hair. I would have sat still, except apparently I'd managed to bring some of the slithery things along for the ride. So I jumped to my feet and did a spastic dance. Snakes, tentacles, what the fuck ever, I wanted it off and I wanted it off _now._

It wasn't snakes. Not that it wouldn't have been bad enough, snakes falling out of someone's gut, but I couldn't be that lucky. Oh no. What I got was a crawling combination of worms and intestines with a little barracuda tossed in. They undulated slow and sure like the worm, were ropy and dripping with intestinal fluids, and had the bear trap mouth of a barracuda. I didn't scream, but it was a near thing. Thank anything that was listening that it hadn't gotten down my boot. Or worse yet, _up_ my pants leg.

While I was inventing a brand new dance, Niko was entertaining himself with two of the remaining Annis. And by entertaining, I mean he had one handcuffed and down, and was taking the other apart in sharp thin slices with the katana. The handcuffed one was writhing, hissing, and biting the ground like a rabid dog. The one Niko was...playing with...was mostly just screaming in a thin whistling hoarse voice of a crushed larynx. It was a tossup whether or not it would suffocate before it bled out, or before Niko got bored and killed it. He did get bored, sometimes. Right now, with a contented smile on his face and his eyes gone cold, hard, and flame-bright with cruelty, I didn't think he was likely to get bored. I shrugged off my jacket and examined my bitten arm. The Annis has gotten more leather than skin; I had some ragged puncture marks but no chunks missing. It was bleeding pretty well, though.

"Hmm. They don't last long, do they?" Niko commented, idly, and there was that spine-shuddering satisfaction in his voice. I looked up. He was standing tall, staring down at the dead mess, severed limbs and peeled skin and flayed muscle, guts wriggling free of the body through the great rents in the abdomen. Niko was liberally coated in sprays of blood; there was even some on his face. He glanced at me, and smiled bright as a child with a favorite toy. "Well. It was fun while it lasted." He turned toward me, and pulled a handkerchief from a pocket as he walked. He wiped down his katana first, then his face, then stopped in front of me, bent, and wiped my face, too.

I scrunched my eyes shut and let him. To be honest, he scared the shit out of me when he was like this, in a hell of a mood. He'd never hurt me, no, but there was just something sick about it. When he was done I nodded to my arm. "It got me."

"Clumsy," he scolded, but gently, and magicked a clean handkerchief from his pocket. He pressed it over the bites. I reached up and held pressure, and he stepped away. He toed the bile-dripping wriggling thing that had wrapped around my leg. "Do you want a pet? One would fit nicely in a terrarium."

"Yeah, and I'm just one giant snack on the other side of the glass. No." I pulled a repulsed face. Besides, they stank.

" 'All things bright and beautiful, all creatures great and small,' " he quoted, smiling at me.

"You sure God made these?" I asked, doubtfully, and shrugged my jacket back on. I put the bloody handkerchief back in my pocket.

"Well," Niko said, thoughtfully, with affection warm in his voice, "He made you, didn't He?"

He meant it kindly. I knew that. Still didn't stop me from grimacing. "No, the Auphe made me. Remember?"

"No, they bred you, but they didn't make you the person you are." He paused. "Monster? Individual, there, that's appropriately neutral phrasing."

"Fuck you and your mother with your semantics," I told him. He laughed, because she'd been my mother too. Yeah, it wasn't very funny, but we had to get our laughs in somewhere. I laughed too, and we went to get the Annis.

Transporting her without getting bitten was tough work. She was not interested in being nice and still, either. And she kicked. Fortunately not_ too_ hard, but after she nailed me right in the nuts I had to sit on the ground and pant for a minute. Niko had the kindness not to laugh or make a snide comment. A man's balls should be sacred territory, because _fuck_ that hurts. We finally got her to where our client was waiting. Niko had put in a call, earlier, while I'd been nursing my personal injury, and explained that there was no lamia to be had, but at least we had the party responsible for that lack. The vampire stepped out of the trees to meet us: dark hair, dark eyes, dark very expensive-looking suit... Typical. We dumped the snarling, spitting Annis at his feet.

"They suffered?" the vampire asked, staring down at the Annis. His voice was cool and empty. At least with rage you'd go quickly, but the icy retribution his tone promised... Yeah. Like Niko's fun, only more personal. Niko didn't hate the things he played with; he just...okay, hell if I knew _why_ he did it. Sadism, maybe. But he didn't hate them. Hate was maybe the worst, I thought.

"They did," I answered, but knowing Niko's fun would be very different from this. "They suffered."

Surprisingly, even though we hadn't delivered the requested lamia, we got paid. A nice fat wad of cash in an envelope was passed over to Niko. As we walked away, he pulled it out and started counting it under his breath. Behind us, short sharp staccato screams rose on the cool night air. Torture. I grimaced and trailed along after Niko. It just...struck a wrong chord in me. Creeped me out. And that was saying something, given my Auphe relatives enjoyed torturing things. They had it down to a damn _art._ For fuck's sake, they had _poetry_ about it. Okay, so it was less Edgar Allen Poe and more like shitty drunk freeform beatnik rap, but it was poetry. Oral tradition, Niko called it, and was pretty damn fascinated by it, which meant a lot of hard mental gymnastics for me, because I was the only Auphe-speaking member of the entire race that would actually attempt to translate it into English for him instead of eating his face off first. Which sucked because like a lot of other primitive languages and cultures, Auphe had words that you really couldn't translate into English because there _was_ no English word for it.

Like this one insult. It's a little curling snarl, growl, and flick of the head. The Auphe only use it on eachother, a familial thing because they're all related. Cousin isn't a term of endearment, it's a fact, because incestuous-sister-mother-of-my-children just doesn't roll off the tongue so snappily. Anyway, I used it on Niko once right after a nightmare, and when he tried to get me to translate it, we ran into some issues. It...kinda translates into 'gonna shank ya, bitch-cuz, and eat yo sheep-self,' except there's all this disdain, arrogance, and platonic hate that just doesn't get translated.

Platonic hate and linguistic gymnastics.

My life _sucks_ sometimes. God. Really.

Niko shoved the envelope into a pocket, and tossed me a little pleased smile. That was definitely going to keep us in groceries for a bit. I walked a little closer and crunched leaves underfoot with complete disregard for predator-like silence. Niko's smile lingered, and he walked in utter silence. Show-off bastard. Well, I'd have fun with the fallen leaves, at least. It was a perfect fall night, now that we'd left the screams behind. Chill and crisp and the musty-spicy-richness of fallen leaves everywhere.

Then we saw what was hanging in the last line of the trees, pale in the moonlight. Heavy and ripe like fruit, the colour of a nectarine...pale salmon blooming with red. Lots and lots of red. Bodies. In the trees.

We both stopped short.

Five bodies, in the trees, ripped and torn. Two men, three women. Splayed in the branches, and not very old, either, with blood still dripping in a gentle rain against the fallen leaves, pat-pat-pat. One of the women was young, barely sixteen, with long, long hair hanging down like a banner. The wind shifted and I got a faceful of iron and the sour-sweet beginnings of rot. I gagged, for a moment _tasting_ it and my stomach roiled with the memory of raw human flesh.

Niko grabbed me by an arm and spun me around, fingers clenched painfully on my arm, digging into the bone. He was trying to help but anger flared and I wrenched away from him. I was shaken but not _triggered_, I was fine. "Shit, Nik, I'm fine, okay? Just a lot of blood all at once." It was_ strong_ and I turned to stare up into the trees again, against the uneasy churn in my gut, against the chill that said getting triggered into a panic attack or a flashback was closer than I wanted it to be. The aching start of a bruise where Niko had grabbed me kept me grounded firmly in the present. "Think the Annis did it?"

Niko stepped closer and put a hand gently on either of my upper arms. I could feel his breath warm in my hair as he bowed his head over mine. "I'm not sure," he said, very softly, deep voice a quiet rumble for my ears only. "Come away, Cal."

I realized I had a hand pressed over my mouth.

Maybe Niko was right.

When I turned to move, I was shivering. And it wasn't from the cold. It was actually really damn hard to just turn around. There's something really fucking creepy about a corpse at your back, especially if it's human. Niko was right behind me, though, an arm across my shoulders, hand cupped around my arm, and that made it easier. Niko had always been there, and he would keep me safe. Yeah, childish of me, I know, but...

...it was the truth.

We walked away, and Niko drove us home.

Only when we _got_ home, we had company. Company that had parked his gorgeous 1966 cherry-red Mustang in our garage.

"Oh fffffuuuuuck," I said.

"Looks like he got tired of waiting for you to come to him," said Niko. "Get out and open the door, Cal. And man the fuck up."

I answered that with a phrase in Rom I'd learned from Sophia. Our mother had been a great one for the foul, vulgar, and downright nasty insults. Niko snorted, smirking, and I went and opened the other huge rolling door so Niko could park our El Camino. Robin had at least finished my sweeping job, which was nice of him. We climbed up the stairs, Niko scratching at the drying blood on his face, and found Robin had finished sweeping inside, too. The lights were on, and Robin was sitting on the clean, naked floor on a pillow. I had a feeling it was probably Niko's, from the bedroom. He was reading one of Niko's mythology books, too, and looked up at us with solemn green eyes.

It always creeped me out when Robin went_ serious,_ because most of the time was was smiling, laughing, and shallow as a puddle in the Sahara. Except when he wasn't. He did offer a faint smile though. "There's takeout."

Niko snorted, and sat down in the doorway to take off his boots. "I said lock up, not move in, Robin," he teased, and there was a warm familiarity in his tone I really wasn't used to hearing him use. On other people...well, no. That definitely wasn't the way he teased me, and that was why it was weird. "Cal. Boots. Then we'll go take care of your arm. Before infection sets in."

That was a blatant excuse for me to not be alone with Robin, because I never got infections. Hell, I never even got sick. So I bent to my boots, grateful. Niko wasn't going to let me do this alone, just like I'd asked. He'd never gone back on a promise to me, and I knew that, but this was me and my anxiety being all illogical. Hurrah.

As Niko herded me to the bathroom with a hand on my shoulder, I could feel Robin watching us go.


	3. Chapter Three: Truth and Lies

**A/N:** I do not own anyone from the Cal Leandros series. I do not own the song lyrics used to start this piece! This song, however, has been the song for "Robin and the brother's relationship" song ever since I heard it, way back near the start of this morbid series.

Thanks to Parnassus for the uber-prompt review! Thanks also to Comuterale, SensiblyTainted, halesgirl101, and Kin-outcast1 for reviewing!

Sorry about the late update: I worked today. Whew, the ER was busy and I was in the psyche ward. I've also been busy with this pretty little project: ht tp colon slash slash hellgatesnafu dot dreamwidth dot org slash profile

Some of you might like it. Now, on to the big confrontation!

* * *

_**Chapter Three:** Truth and Lies_

* * *

_I'm sure you recognize my noise and you've heard about the pit  
__Been told to be afraid of everything that lives within  
__But it's much worse where you are  
__So will you go for it?  
__I have a feeling you might, feeling you might_

_Somebody somewhere will clean out your wounds  
__With dirty fingers, we'll bury the lie  
__Somebody somewhere will clean out your wounds  
__And bury the lie, bury the lie...  
_-"The Pit," The Silversun Pickups

* * *

Niko scrubbed my arm, bandaged it, and declared, "Not bad. They had the teeth of an adolescent crocodile."

"Didn't feel like a baby one to me," I grumbled, and washed my face with the hot washcloth Niko handed me, removing the worst of the blood-spatter. I pulled my torn, dirty shirt back on after I was done, because Niko had made it clear showers would wait until we'd eaten and Robin'd had his say. I didn't want to go out there. I didn't want to talk about it.

Niko washed his own face, and glanced at me in the mirror. He sighed, exasperation in his tone. "Don't_ sulk_," he chided.

Fuck him, if I wanted to sulk, I was damn well _going_ to, and he didn't have to sound so fucking _condescending_ about it. That stung. I bared my teeth at him, briefly, and crossed my arms. "Fuck off, Nik."

He gave me a raised eyebrow glance over his shoulder, a little surprised by the sharpness in my voice. "Cal," he said, calmly and evenly.

"I said_ fuck off_," I bit out. I was angry now, unsettled, and trying not to be afraid of what Robin would say, what was going to change. It was going to hurt and I didn't want to. I had to do this, but nobody'd said I had to do it _gracefully_.

Nobody except Nik. He dropped the washcloth in the sink, turned to face me, and crossed his own arms across his chest. There was warning in the lift of his chin, the set of his lips. "Don't be rude, little monster," he said, but what he meant was '_stop being an idiot._' Niko didn't suffer fools lightly, not even me.

I gritted my teeth, then forced my jaw to relax. "I'll mind my manners."

Niko eyed me, because he knew I only half meant it, but he let it slide. He turned and walked out into the living room, where we'd left Robin. I stopped and leaned in the doorway between the living room and the kitchen. There was Greek takeout on the counter, still hot. It smelled good. My stomach was doing nasty flips, and my palms were sweaty. Damn.

Robin nodded to us both. "If you don't mind, Niko, I'd like to talk to Caliban alone."

"No," I told him, sharply. "You're not. You can say whatever the fuck it is in front of Niko."

So much for minding my manners. But I knew, and Robin knew, and Niko knew.

Niko paused in the act of sitting down on the bare floor, one hand against the cheap linoleum. "Cal," he said, warningly.

"No. He wants to talk to me about the bruises. The pinch-marks." I glared at them both, and tried not to shake. "Your reminders."

Niko nodded, and sat down cross-legged, folding himself effortlessly into the lotus position. "I see. But you told him about them?"

"He did," Robin interjected, looking between us, "But he had other bruises. You told me I could ask later, Caliban. It's later."

"I also told you not to fuckin' ask at all," I growled, and chickened out. I couldn't _do_ it, not with Robin's green eyes deep and cool and kind on me. I couldn't. "I'm not having this conversation. I'm going to eat." I turned to go into the kitchen.

"_Cal._"

Niko's voice was a whipcrack across the space between us.

I flinched and swung back around in a jolt, looking at him. He wasn't angry, no, I saw in a flash, but he was_ firm_. I wasn't getting out of this, and my heart sank even as the anger came back...but then, Niko never lied when he was caught.

He didn't care. My problem was I cared too damn much this time. I started to turn again, testing.

"Come here." Cool, firm, and undeniable. I hesitated for only a moment, but the quiet, "Now," that followed it dragged me across the floor. Unwilling as I was, disobeying Niko when he'd decided something had to be done...fuck. I didn't_ like_ it, but I didn't have to right now. It was going to be done anyway. Niko lifted his chin and looked up at me, ignoring Robin utterly. I couldn't even look that way, but definitely couldn't ignore Robin.

"Well," Niko said, coolly, reasonably, "Show the man what he wants to see."

I wanted to punch him in the face. Damn him. _Damn_ him for making me do this. I growled at him, deep and full-chested and not even remotely human.

Niko raised a single blonde brow and didn't move or soften an inch.

With a spat curse I roughly reached up and wrenched my shirt off, skewing my ponytail half out, not caring. I dropped the shirt on the floor and flung my arms wide, glaring at Niko. "Happy?" I snarled.

I didn't _just_ have little freckle-bruise pinch marks on the back of my arms and neck. I had bruises ringed around my wrists and upper arms where Niko would grab me, a set of bruises down a flank where he'd punched me, a weird curved bruise of a bare-footed kick over my shoulderblade, and the newest, bright blue down my back, were long thin strips where he'd taken the flat of his katana to me for being sloppy in a spar. These were only the fresh blue ones; I had every shade from blue to yellow and green and brown, old marks fading slowly. The burn-mark on my left palm was still bright pink, and there were short thin white knife-scars on my back and shoulders, cigarette burns from Sophia, the jagged Auphe-claw-marks on my shoulders from where they'd tortured me. The scar on my chest where Niko had stabbed me through. And the tattoo on my right bicep, black and red: _ABOMINATION_.

Niko said nothing, merely got to his feet. He reached out and very gently wrapped his fingers around my upper arm. Each digit matched up perfectly to its shadow-bruise mark on my flesh, stark purple against the paleness of my skin. Niko tugged lightly, and when I stepped forward, he bent and kissed me on the forehead, tenderly. I closed my eyes and fought off the urge to slug him in the gut. It would end badly, worse than this whole damn circus already was.

"Thank you," he said, leaning back. He let go, calloused fingers running down my arm before dropping away. "Now go eat."

Dismissed. I turned and made the fastest retreat known to man, not even bothering to retrieve my shirt. I couldn't. I _couldn't._ I didn't want to look at Robin.

I got my food, and retreated to the bedroom, trying not to hear the quiet murmur of voices. I shut the door behind me, sat on the floor, and shook so hard for a little while I could barely hold my fork.

I ate my food, and when I heard Niko and Robin start to shout, I put in my earbuds and cranked my mp3 player up. It felt...weird. And familiar. This was how I used to try to block out Sophia and Niko's screaming fights all the time. Robin and Niko weren't screaming, but... And sitting on the floor, in a dump of an apartment, eating takeout with Niko's and my stuff still packed up in bags around me in the dark. Yeah, it took me back, and not in a good way. I ate half my supper before I got too sick-feeling. I found a clean-ish T-shirt and pulled it on. It was one of Nik's, and it smelled liked it should, safe and right. I pulled my knees to my chest and listened to Depeche Mode and waited.

But it wasn't Niko who came to find me, wiping blood off his face and smiling from the fight, like my memories said.

No, it was Robin, and that was so out of place it made me feel like I'd been dreaming or asleep.

He came in very quietly, and lingered backlit in the doorway for a few moments. He crossed the distance in utter silence, then crouched beside me. "Why aren't you on the bed?" he asked, and after a moment I decided it was genuine curiosity in his voice. I looked up and the rumpled, un-made bed behind me, then at Robin.

"I didn't want to get dirt in the sheets. Itches like hell."

Robin laughed a little, and turned to sit like I was, with our backs against the bed. I still had my knees pulled up to my chest, but Robin let his long, long legs stretch out. I turned my music down and pulled an earbud out. See, I was polite. But for a little while, Robin didn't say anything. He was staring off into space, and the light slithering in through the partially-open door painted his face in sharp lines and stark shadows.

"Is it true?" he asked at last, very gently. "He says you're free to go when you like."

Well, that wasn't what I'd been expecting. I didn't know _what_ I'd been expecting. But I nodded. "Yeah. He's told me that for a coupla years now. If I want to go, all I have to do is say it and we'll split."

Robin looked at me now, and without the shallow smile on his face he was ancient and wise and powerful, a god among mortals. Easy to see how he'd been worshipped once, as he'd bragged before, but I wondered if they'd ever seen him like this, quiet and grave and kind. "But you won't leave, will you?"

"I don't want to. Robin...he needs me. You know he does. I...he loves me, Robin." To my horror, my voice broke over it. "Sophia hated me. Everyone who knows I'm Aupheling hates me. Niko knows and Niko doesn't care and he loves me. He'll do anything for me." I had to stop. I was too close to breaking out in tears.

"You know," said Robin, very softly, "that if he loves you, he shouldn't hit you."

I laughed, thick and choked. "I know. But hell, Robin, our only role model was _Sophia_. When she wasn't drunk she was high. We learned how to lie, steal, cheat, sleep with anything that would pay us, how to get illegal drugs of all kinds, and how to get away with murder. Literally. If she wasn't ignoring us she was screaming at us and throwing things."

"She beat you too?" Robin asked.

"No. She didn't like to touch me. Every time she did she'd wiped her hands off real fast, like she'd touched something slimy." And for a long time, that had hurt a lot. Niko had always held me, loved me, and never flinched away. "She beat Nik. They'd start fighting and she'd hit him. She just threw things at me. Bottles and plates and shit. Once she tried to hit me with a cast iron skillet." It would have killed me, if it had hit. Niko had blacked her eye for it. I shook my head. "She'd do it for _stupid_ reasons, too. Or for _no_ reason. We'd be sitting there good and quiet and not even _doing_ anything, and she'd come in drunk and high and smelling like sex and scream at us. She...one time she kicked Niko in the face so hard she split both his lips and knocked out three of his baby teeth. All the front ones."

"Cal. Cal. It's alright," Robin broke in, and touched my shoulder. I was shaking and my voice had gone high and thin. I stopped and tried to breathe. Robin said something in Greek, his voice low and rough and raw, and when I looked up at him there was grief heavy in his face and tears in his eyes. He reached out and gathered me up. Shocked into stillness, with my head on his shoulder and his arms around my back, I listened to the words I didn't understand and wondered what I'd said wrong.

Everything, probably.

At last he lapsed into silence. I was actually feeling pretty comfortable, because Robin was much warmer than I was, and he was being very careful, and he smelled rich and earthy and clean. It was a good smell, and a calming one. Which was a little weird, because really only Niko ever hugged me, but I felt just as safe as if it had been Niko's arms around me. And then it hit me - Robin was still_ here_. He hadn't gone away. And when he leaned back, looking me in the eye, there was that immortal sadness, great and terrible...but no pity. No condescension.

I don't know what I looked like, but he smiled very sadly, and smoothed my messed hair. "Life has been cruel to you, and yet you smile, and yet you love. Caliban, you are a greater miracle than you know." He bent, and kissed me on top of the head, like a blessing. I blinked, and found myself really, really close to tears. Robin simply smiled, and when I shifted he let his hands fall away.

Biting my lip, I got to my feet. I rubbed my face, and gathered up my half-eaten food. "I...should take these out before I forget."

"Good thinking." Robin rose as well, and dusted his slacks off. I padded across the floor, into the hall, and into the kitchen.

Niko was sitting on the floor, eating. I stopped, puzzled, because usually he sat on the counter. He looked at us both, mild curiosity in his eyes.

There was a bruise blooming fresh and red across his cheek.

Looking back, I honestly can't say why that triggered me. It wasn't like Niko didn't come home with half-a-dozen bruises after his cage fights. But it it. It was like a cross between a flashback and a panic attack, all at once. I dropped everything that I was holding, and my brain blanked out. When I came back, I was screaming at the top of my lungs, and Niko's arms were tight around my waist, holding me back.

"_You hit him, you bitch, you hit him again you bitch whore...!_"

I broke off, gasping. Robin was staring wide-eyed with a set of red lines across his cheek. My hands were wrenched hard into clawed shapes. My throat hurt and my hands hurt.

"Shhh, shhh," Niko crooned, into my ear. "Shhh, Cal, it's okay. Cal, Cal. Hush, Cal. Little monster, hush hush."

I slumped back against him. Niko sank to the floor with me, and pressed his cheek against the top of my head. There were tears on my face. "Hush Cal. It's okay, little brother. Hush now."

"N-Nik?" I managed, and uncurled my hands. There was skin under my fingernails. I looked up at Robin. "Oh God, Robin, I...I'm s-sorry. I didn't..."

"It's okay." Robin crossed the distance between us, and knelt. He put his hands over mine without hesitation. "You panicked."

I was shaking, but I didn't really feel any worse than I had. Niko shifted, and with a heave pulled me into his lap. I pushed at him, and he let me go. I slithered off onto the floor. I didn't...I felt too weird. I leaned against his shoulder, and with a sigh he reached up and started fussing with my messed-up ponytail. Robin chuckled a little, and sat on the floor as well, his knee touching mine. He reached up and felt at the scratches. I winced.

"I'm sorry. I don't...I don't know what happened. I just...I don't know." I tipped my head back to the pull as Niko fingercombed snarls out of my hair. "Ow, Nik, that pulled."

Niko hummed an apologetic note, but kept working. He didn't like it when my hair was messy. It bothered him. So he'd fix it. And it was a hell of a lot easier to let him fix it than deal with the pestering that would result if I refused. "You keep doing that," he said, abruptly.

Robin gave him a puzzled look. I blinked. "What?"

"Your hands. You did it yesterday during our spar." Niko tugged at my hair, pulling it up into the right height for my normal ponytail. He snapped the elastic in with a few expert twists of his fingers. Then he grabbed my shoulder and threw me over backwards. He grabbed my wrists and went perfectly still. I did too, and realized I was inches away from clawing at his face.

Claws. I blinked, flat on my back with my legs sprawled everywhere. The realization was bitter. "Claws. The Auphe have claws."

Niko let me go with a thoughtful hum. His grey eyes were deeply contemplative over the bruise. "I wonder," he said, but said nothing else as I sat up.

I glanced at Robin, who shook his head and shrugged. He didn't get it either. I looked around at the kitchen. It felt surreal, like a dream. I rubbed absently at the stinging purple mark on one wrist: Niko had made the already-damaged area bleed again by grabbing it, though he'd been gentle. I felt almost naked without long sleeves on. There was my takeout spilled across the floor. Niko's was neatly upright and out of danger. I glanced at him again. He was staring fixedly at the floor, fingers tapping on his knees and toes wriggling against the tile as he thought very hard.

I got to my feet and moved towards the sink. I needed to clean up my mess. Robin got up, too.

"I'll help." He eyed Niko as he passed him. "What is it?"

"He's thought of something. He'll tell me later." I shrugged, and wet down a dishcloth. I looked up at the reddened mark on Robin's cheek. The same cheek that was newly bruised on Niko, I realized, and suddenly felt a lot less sorry about it. I went to clean, and it was so fuckin' _weird_ to see my bare arms and Robin kneeling to help scoop the noodles into the styrofoam both at once.

I didn't mind the bruises anymore. I was used to them.

"You hit Nik." I hadn't quite meant to say that. I knew it wasn't going to end well.

Robin glanced at me, but before I could decipher what was in his deep green gaze, Niko's voice answered and distracted us both. "He did. You've expressed your opinions on that already. Let it alone." He was eating again, nonchalant. I opened my mouth to protest, and he pinned me with a cool and quiet stare. Calm. "After all I've done, it's the least I deserve, Cal. Monsters don't get happy endings."

That rang true.

Monsters like Niko, like me, we didn't get happy endings. I went back to wiping up cheese and sauce. It was _true_, but it didn't mean I had to like seeing Niko with a bruise. A bruise from someone else.

Okay, whoa. That was a freaky thought.

I paused and examined it.

A bruise from me didn't jar. He hit me, I hit him. We sparred hard, played harder, and hell, Niko had fucking scars from my teeth. I had scars from his knives. But a mark from someone else...Sophia, Robin, a monster trying to kill him...it made me feel sick, angry, ugly.

I suddenly realized why Niko always wanted to look over every bruise I got in a fight. Wow.

We were some sick bastards, weren't we?

"Just one question." Robin's voice drew me out of my thoughts. "If you know it's wrong, why don't you stop?" This was flung like a weapon at Niko, hard and hurt and lost, as Robin knelt on the cheap linoleum floor.

Niko met his gaze evenly, and his answer was so soft and gentle I barely heard it.

"What makes you think I haven't?"

It drove deep. Robin flinched, and Niko didn't let up. If Robin's question had been a weapon, Niko's was poison. "When all you've ever known is poverty, cruelty, and fear, how hard is it to live above it? When the mother you once loved hates you and everything you love, when she's a threat and not a protector, what do you become? Robin, what makes you think that I haven't tried?"

And Robin...did not answer. He bowed his head instead.

I stared at Niko. He looked back at me. "Clean that up, Cal," he prodded, gently, and smiled at me; sad but fond and warm. Right. I was cleaning up my mess. I went back to wiping. Almost through.

Robin sighed, and got to his feet with the takeout container. He walked over to the trash and dumped it in. Niko looked up at him, and I was struck by the height difference. Niko and Robin were usually almost on a level; Robin was only a little shorter than Nik. But now, Niko's head barely came to Robin's waist.

I swiped the last of the sauce up and got to my feet, to carry the cloth to the sink and rinse it out. I stood there a moment, though, because Niko and Robin were staring at one another, solemn and silent. And this time it was Niko who closed his eyes and sighed.

"I'm not sure how I'll pay you back for all you've done, but I will. I won't leave you a debt and a bad taste in your mouth to remind you of us."

I was confused, then my heart caught in my chest. Did Niko think...was Robin going to leave after all?

Robin stood statue still a moment longer. Then he moved, and crossed the gap. He bent, and laid his hand over Niko's blonde head. Niko's eyes flew open, and he stared up at Robin, surprise written on his face. Robin's voice was heavy, and there was no laughter in him as he promised us this:

"You don't have to, Niko. You have been left too often, the both of you. I won't leave you now."

* * *

_You recognize my noise and you've heard about the pit_  
_Been told to be afraid of everything that comes with it_  
_We can talk about it later, but I think you've given in_  
_We can talk about it later, but I think you've given in_

_I had a feeling you might...bury the lie..._

-"The Pit," The Silversun Pickups


End file.
